


Imperative

by AceSpacePup



Category: Age of Ultron (Marvel Movies), Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: AOS Compliant, Agents of SHIELD spoilers, Clint-centric, MCU compliant, MCU compliant until I say so, Probable Canon Divergence, also until i say so, aos spoilers, because let's face it, cap 2 spoilers, find clint 2k14, i have a lot of head canons and they're all going here, in this for the long haul folks, maybe pairings later? i dunno, post captain america 2: the winter soldier, team coulson, there won't be canon to follow soon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-25
Updated: 2014-04-25
Packaged: 2018-01-20 17:33:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1519256
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AceSpacePup/pseuds/AceSpacePup
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Finding one's safe house up in flames was not an ideal way to return from recon. Without hesitating, Clint bolted as casually as possible until he ended up in a relatively crowded piazza. He risked closing his eyes for a moment and inhaled deeply through his nose. One, two, three breaths later Clint regained enough inward composure to begin making a plan. First things first, he needed to figure out what the hell was going on."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Imperative

**Author's Note:**

> Find Clint 2k14
> 
> Proofread but not beta'd yet

Clint rested his back against the winter-chilled stone wall of a building that flanked the busy market square in which he found himself. His posture was relaxed, and outwardly it appeared as though he were simply a tourist taking a small break from sightseeing. Despite appearances, his heart was pounding. Finding one's safe house up in flames was not an ideal way to return from recon. Without hesitating, Clint bolted as casually as possible until he ended up in a relatively crowded piazza. He risked closing his eyes for a moment and inhaled deeply through his nose. One, two, three breaths later Clint regained enough inward composure to begin making a plan. First things first, he needed to figure out what the hell was going on.

.. -- .--. . .-. .- - .. ...- .

After the Battle of New York, Clint spent the first few months being put through a battery of psych and medical evaluations. While undergoing the exams, Clint was unable to leave base. Not being in the field left him to wallow in his thoughts, and wallowing for Clint meant over-training. While he had no (little) issue accepting that what he had done was accomplished under fairly absolute mind control, he was having difficulty coming to terms with his inability to resist. Logically he knew there was probably nothing that could have been done. Nonetheless, Clint found himself working his body and researching ways to thwart mind attacks should he ever come up against something like it again. He prayed that would never be a scenario, because nothing Clint found seemed viable.

When it became increasingly apparent that his search was leading nowhere, Clint turned to his new handler. Sitwell, who had worked with Strike Team Delta on numerous occasions, was recently tasked with leading the efforts to recover the Chitauri weapons that had fallen when Natasha closed the portal. He suggested that Clint help with the ground clean-up. For a while that gave Clint purpose, and although he wasn’t privy to any information above his current Level 2 access, he felt like he could at least contribute something if he wasn’t in the field. For a while that worked. For a while Clint felt okay. But after a while, Clint found himself standing in the rubble and ruin of New York imaging that nothing changed at all. It was just another post-mission clean-up that with which Clint had volunteered to help. He could hear Coulson giving orders from a mobile command unit. Expect, when he shook his head, he remembered that it wasn’t Phil’s voice he heard. It was Sitwell’s, and that was something he resolutely was not thinking about.

By that time, Psych noticed that although Clint thrived on purpose, the environment in which he had found it was not the healthiest. Their solution: clearing him for active field duty with the approval of Medical, who agreed that there were no lasting neurological effects of Loki’s staff. So, his clearance level was raised to Level 4, and he was assigned a temporary team. Clint was a little annoyed that he wasn’t back to former clearance, but Natasha, who at the time was assisting Maria with some in-house personnel work, told him to “buck up,” so he did. Since then, he had run a few operations consisting mostly of providing cover and surveillance. Three months after his first mission back on duty, a SHIELD courier stopped him on his way to the commissary and handed him a manilla envelope stamped “URGENT”. Clint continued walking and slid the contents into his hand. What he saw made him about face and head directly to Fury’s office.

Despite being cleared by Psych, Medical, and many (but not all) of his colleagues, the World Security Council still deemed Clint an “active hostile” whose “actions against the Strategic Homeland Intervention Enforcement and Logistics Division” were such that he “must be interned and neutralized (if necessary)” so that “the security and integrity of the organization may be upheld for the sake of parties both domestic and abroad”. In a state of mild shock, Clint requested entry to Fury’s office, was granted permission, and slapped the papers outlining his crimes onto the director’s desk.

“Sir,” he began. “I thought this was over.”

“So did I. Those bastards went behind my back,”  

“Normally I’d make some comment about you doing the same thing more than once, and how maybe you had it coming, but seeing as how this,” Clint waved at the file, “makes it sound like I’m about to be hanged kind of kills the mood.”

Fury eyed Clint with his usual intensity before speaking again. “Agent Barton, I’m not about to let one of our best assets get put on some kangaroo court to made an example of. I need you to disappear.”

“That’s what they need, too, apparently,” Clint huffed, but Fury didn’t rise to his complaint.

“I need you to be my new good eye.” If it were at all possible, Fury’s usual no-nonsense tone took on an even graver sound.

“Sir?”

“The implosion of the PEGASUS project brought some things to light, things that I don’t particularly care for.”

“Things, Sir?”

“Your reports while on base brought my attention to some discrepancies in output data on Phase 2,” Fury said, handing Clint a large file.

“My reports from base? Did you find something in here?”

“Nothing concrete, but enough to put a bad feeling in my gut, and you know how I hate that.” Fury walked around his desk and leant on it while Clint continued to thumb through his reports. “You mentioned several times that the lack of external communication was odd.”

“You’re telling me you don’t think it’s weird that no one on site sent a single text or IM to anyone off base?”

“You didn’t.”

“That’s different, Sir,” Clint said without elaborating. “But if you’ll remember, I also said that there were on base interactions that I thought were unusual.”

“You mentioned Agent Rumlow caught your attention.”

“Rumlow had been transferred to the base by Sitwell about a week after Coulson and I arrived, but by the second day, he had already established a regular posse. From what I know of the guy, he’s likeable enough, but for a strike leader, he sure hung around with a lot of Selvig’s colleagues.” Clint frowned trying to remember if he had overheard anything. Nothing came to mind, so he let it go. “It could have been nothing, Sir.”

“You don’t believe that, do you?”

“Not for a second. You don’t either by the look of it.”

“You’re damn right I don’t. And that’s why I need you. The last energy output readings from PEGASUS show a gradual decrease of power from the time we brought the tesseract to the base until the time the damn thing went critical.”

“You think someone was siphoning off the power?”

“Some _one_? No.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah.”

“So you need me to disappear.”

“I need you to disappear.”

.. -- .--. . .-. .- - .. ...- . 

Before pushing himself off the wall, Clint scanned the square for his next destination. If his location had been intentionally compromised, and by now he very much believed that to be the case, he needed to make his way to a secure location and above all else, contact Fury with his status. Not wanting to risk his cell, he ditched the device in a garbage can as he moved towards a cafe across the piazza. He kept his gait casual and unaffected, slowing down every now and then to check out the items on display. Clint hadn’t noticed anyone tailing him, but he couldn’t afford to be taken off guard. By the time he reached the cafe, Clint had acquired a new scarf and wool cap, neither of which called any unwanted attention to him.  

“Buongiorno,” Clint said with no trace of an accent. “Un cappuccino e...questa.” Clint held up one of the pre-paid phone cards displayed on the counter and moved to a spot to better see the tv. When Clint’s drink arrived, he absently poured in a sugar and shifted his attention to whatever was on screen. At this time of day, Rai Uno typically broadcast a rundown of top world news incidents. As Clint continued to watch however, he saw that only one story was being reported.

_“We’re back now with more information from Washington, D.C., where the headquarters of SHIELD, the American government agency associated with the 2012 alien invasion of New York City, has just been attacked.”_

**Author's Note:**

> Standard disclaimer. Nothing Marvel is mine.


End file.
